Eschatology

This is the thirteenth in a short (!) series of posts dealing with the proper interpretation of Old Testament Kingdom Prophecy (OTKP). If you’re new to this subject (or to my blog), you’ll want to read the essay with which I introduced the series (just click here).

My goal in these eschatological adventures is two-fold.

First, I want to open up something of the Christ-centered truth and beauty of OTKP to my brothers and sisters in the Lord.

Secondly, I want to reason a little with my premillennial brethren. In particular, I want to make the case that we all will best understand, enjoy, and profit from OTKP when we see that its true sphere of fulfillment is: 1) Christ, 2) the New Covenant he instituted by his blood, 3) the two-staged spiritual Kingdom he has already introduced (and will soon consummate), and, 4) the New Covenant community he is creating out of elect Jews and Gentiles: the Church.

In short, I would like my premillennial brothers to reconsider the amillennial approach to the interpretation of OTKP.

Since the end of the age will soon be upon us, it is important that we stand together as much as possible. Seeing eye to eye on eschatology would definitely help. These essays—and the book in progress from which they are extracted—represent my best effort at contributing to that worthy goal.

Ezekiel’s Last Battle (Ezekiel 38-39)

This is a long post. It had to be, because the text it discusses is long, difficult, and very important. Hopefully, you will find it more than worthwhile!

These two controversial chapters describe the Deception, Destruction, and Disposal of Israel’s great eschatological enemies: Gog and his worldwide confederation of evil armies.

In the latter days, by divine decree, they will go up against a people fully restored to the LORD and his covenant blessings. Thinking to annihilate them and seize their homeland, Gog and his armies themselves will be annihilated: Under furious strokes of divine judgment they will fall to their complete and everlasting destruction upon the mountains of Israel.

An Oracle of Good News?

While the prospect of such an attack would surely have been unsettling to devout Jews from Ezekiel’s day onward, it is easy to see how they could also reckon it an Oracle of Good News. Yes, God himself is behind the dreadful assault, so it will surely come to pass. But far from being a judgment against his people, it will actually be final retribution against their remaining enemies. Moreover, on that day Israel herself will not even have to fight, for God, as at the Exodus, will fight for her: with pestilence, blood, flooding rain, great hailstones, fire, and brimstone.

In short, the good news is that this battle will indeed be the last battle; the battle in which God supremely “sets his glory among the nations,” manifesting his absolute sovereignty, justice, wrath, power, goodness, grace, mercy, and love—-and then opening up before his grateful people a door into the eternal blessings of the World to Come (38:16, 23, 39:7, 13, 21).

This is the twelfth in a series of posts dealing with the proper interpretation of Old Testament Kingdom Prophecy (OTKP). If you’re new to this subject (or to my blog), you’ll want to read the essay with which I introduced the series (just click here).

My goal in these eschatological adventures is two-fold.

First, I want to open up something of the Christ-centered truth and beauty of OTKP to my brothers and sisters in the Lord.

Secondly, I want to reason a little with my premillennial brethren. In particular, I want to make the case that we all will best understand, enjoy, and profit from OTKP when we see that its true sphere of fulfillment is: 1) Christ, 2) the New Covenant he instituted by his blood, 3) the two-staged spiritual Kingdom he has already introduced (and will soon consummate), and, 4) the New Covenant community he is creating out of elect Jews and Gentiles: the Church.

In short, I would like my premillennial brothers to reconsider the amillennial approach to the interpretation of OTKP.

Since the end of the age will soon be upon us, it is important that we stand together as much as possible. Seeing eye to eye on eschatology would definitely help. These essays—and the book in progress from which they are extracted—represent my best effort at contributing to that worthy goal.

Since the prophetic texts I deal with are quite long, I have not reproduced them here. You will need to bring an open Bible to each blog. My hope and prayer is that you will enjoy them all.

Two Sticks, One Cross, One Nation

In this short OTKP, the prophet’s theme is the Restored Unity of Eschatological Israel. It’s a promise that must have meant a lot to the Jews of Ezekiel’s day.

As far back as patriarchal times, there had been rivalry between Judah and Joseph. In the days of the Judges, tensions flared between Ephraim (Joseph’s son) and the other tribes. Then, under David and Solomon, the nation was briefly united. But all too soon “sin in the flesh” split the nation into the Northern and Southern Kingdoms, each with its own center(s) of worship. And thus they remained, even until the deportation of the Northern Kingdom (Israel) at the hand of the Assyrians.

One can well imagine that Ezekiel’s devout contemporaries would have despaired of the twelve tribes—now scattered to the four winds—ever being united again as one nation, as one Kingdom under God.

This is the eleventh in a series of posts dealing with the proper interpretation of Old Testament Kingdom Prophecy (OTKP). If you’re new to this subject (or to my blog), you’ll want to read the essay with which I introduced the series (just click here).

My goal in these eschatological adventures is two-fold.

First, I want to open up something of the Christ-centered truth and beauty of OTKP to my brothers and sisters in the Lord.

Secondly, I want to reason a little with my premillennial brethren. In particular, I want to make the case that we all will best understand, enjoy, and profit from OTKP when we see that its true sphere of fulfillment is: 1) Christ, 2) the New Covenant he instituted by his blood, 3) the two-staged spiritual Kingdom he has already introduced (and will soon consummate), and, 4) the New Covenant community he is creating out of elect Jews and Gentiles: the Church.

In short, I would like my premillennial brothers to reconsider the amillennial approach to the interpretation of OTKP.

Since the end of the age will soon be upon us, it is important that we stand together as much as possible. Seeing eye to eye on eschatology would definitely help. These essays—and the book in progress from which they are extracted—represent my best effort at contributing to that worthy goal.

Resurrection Life in the Valley of Dry Bones (Ezekiel 37:1-14)

Ezekiel’s vision of the Valley of Dry Bones is a great favorite among Christians, and with good reason: Its evocative symbolism unfailingly calls to mind their own conversion; the happy day when the sovereign Spirit of God lifted them out of the Valley of the Shadow of Death and planted them in Christ, through whom they have now begun to experience the joy of eternal resurrection life (John 11, Rom. 6:1f, Eph. 2:1-12, Col. 1:13).

However, as good NT exegetes we must honestly ask ourselves: Is this really what the Spirit of God had in mind when he gave Ezekiel this mysterious vision and prophecy?

This is the tenth in a series of posts dealing with the proper interpretation of Old Testament Kingdom Prophecy (OTKP). If you’re new to this subject (or to my blog), you’ll want to read the essay with which I introduced the series (just click here).

My goal in these eschatological adventures is two-fold.

First, I want to open up something of the Christ-centered truth and beauty of OTKP to my brothers and sisters in the Lord.

Secondly, I want to reason a little with my premillennial brethren. In particular, I want to make the case that we all will best understand, enjoy, and profit from OTKP when we see that its true sphere of fulfillment is: 1) Christ, 2) the New Covenant he instituted by his blood, 3) the two-staged spiritual Kingdom he has already introduced (and will soon consummate), and, 4) the New Covenant community he is creating out of elect Jews and Gentiles: the Church.

In short, I would like my premillennial brothers to reconsider the amillennial approach to the interpretation of OTKP.

Since the end of the age will soon be upon us, it is important that we stand together as much as possible. Seeing eye to eye on eschatology would definitely help. These essays—and the book in progress from which they are extracted—represent my best effort at contributing to that worthy goal.

Because the prophetic texts I deal with are quite long, I have not reproduced them here. You will need to bring an open Bible to each blog. My hope and prayer is that you will enjoy them all.

Ezekiel’s Oracles of Good News (Ezekiel 33-48)

This is the first of several blogs in which we will tackle some of the most challenging OTKP’s prophecies in the entire Old Testament. Because of their great difficulty, we are going to have to dig deep, so brace yourself!

Moreover, when the going gets rough, you have to promise me you won’t give up! Again, I recognize that these texts from Ezekiel are controversial, even among the scholars. However, if you will persevere, I believe you are in for a joyous surprise. That’s because the New Covenant Hermeneutic wonderfully opens up these daunting passages (passages you may have avoided for years), so much so that folks actually begin to catch a glimpse of the shape of biblical eschatology as a whole, and also of the winner in the Great End Time Debate!

My purpose in today’s post is to equip you for the journey ahead. The goal is to give you a feel for the context of the prophecies we will be studying; for their place in the overall flow of Ezekiel’s prophetic ministry. Happily, it turns out that this is relatively easy to do, since the book falls neatly into four well-defined sections.

Commentator Iain Duguid outlines them as follows:

Part I: Ezekiel’s Call and Commission (chapters 1-3)

Part II: Oracles of Doom (i.e., prophecies of coming judgment, spoken against apostate Jerusalem and her homeland, chapters 4-24)

Part III: Oracles Against the Nations (i.e., prophecies of coming judgment and redemptive mercy, spoken over Israel’s hostile neighbors, (chapters 4-24)

Part IV: Oracles of Good News (i.e., prophecies whereby Ezekiel arouses the hope and expectation of God’s people, chapters 33-48)

This is the ninth in a short series of posts dealing with the proper interpretation of Old Testament Kingdom Prophecy (OTKP). If you’re new to this subject (or to my blog), you’ll want to read the essay with which I introduced the series (just click here).

My goal in these eschatological adventures is two-fold.

First, I want to open up something of the Christ-centered truth and beauty of OTKP to my brothers and sisters in the Lord.

Secondly, I want to reason a little with my premillennial brethren. In particular, I want to make the case that we all will best understand, enjoy, and profit from OTKP when we see that its true sphere of fulfillment is: 1) Christ, 2) the New Covenant he instituted by his blood, 3) the two-staged spiritual Kingdom he has already introduced (and will soon consummate), and, 4) the New Covenant community he is creating out of elect Jews and Gentiles: the Church.

In short, I would like my premillennial brothers to reconsider the amillennial approach to the interpretation of OTKP.

Since the end of the age will soon be upon us, it is important that we stand together as much as possible. Seeing eye to eye on eschatology would definitely help. These essays—and the book in progress from which they are extracted—represent my best effort at contributing to that worthy goal.

Since the prophetic texts I deal with are quite long, I have not reproduced them here. You will need to bring an open Bible to each blog. My hope and prayer is that you will enjoy them all

The Holy City Shall Be Built

Jeremiah 30-33 contains a great many OT prophecies of the Kingdom, strung together like the pearls of a beautiful necklace. Owing to its concrete historical imagery, this one is especially difficult. Is it amenable to a spiritual, New Covenant interpretation, or must we look for a literal fulfillment in a future millennium?

The Problem in a Nutshell

On the one hand, we can see from verse 40 that this is indeed an OTKP. God is clearly speaking of his eschatological City, a City that will not be plucked up or overthrown any more forever. In other words, according to the New Covenant Hermeneutic, he is actually speaking of the Church.

On the other hand, because this prophecy specifically mentions a number of geographical landmarks familiar to the Jews of Jeremiah’s day, it hardly seems possible that God could be referring to the Church; that he must instead be predicting a latter day restoration of physical Jerusalem, perhaps along the lines anticipated by premillenarians.